LIV Golf voted biggest sports business story of 2022

By GolfDigestME.com
According to a Sports Business Journal reader survey, the inaugural season of the LIV Golf Invitational Series is the biggest sports business story of 2022.

LIV Golf received 27 per cent of votes from readers who selected their response from at least 16 different choices. The influence of name, image and likeness on college sports finished second among the vote-getters with 19 per cent.

Sports Business Journal said: “Neither of those topics were a factor the last time we did our survey, in 2020, and because that year’s edition focused on the duelling dominant forces of that historic year — the pandemic and the social justice movement — it has been three years since we polled executives about the broad state of the industry. In 2019, no one had ever heard of LIV Golf and the chances of NIL both becoming real just a few years later and having the broad, seismic and immediate impact it has had seemed, well, nil.”

LIV Golf held its first tournament in June at the Centurion Club outside London with an innovative format featuring simultaneous team and individual play. Many of the sport’s most recognisable names competed in eight events across North America, Europe, the Middle East East and Asia for the largest prize purses in the game’s history.

Building on its successful start, the LIV Golf League will officially launch in 2023 with 48 players and 12 established team franchises competing in a 14-tournament schedule for an unprecedented $405 million in prize purses. Tournament venues have already been announced for Australia, Mexico, Spain and Singapore.